Urdu Language

Urdu Language

Urdu is a member of the Indo-Aryan family of languages (i.e., those languages descending from Sanskrit), which is in turn a branch of the Indo-Iranian branch (which comprises the Indo-Aryan and the Iranian branch), which itself is a branch of the Indo-European linguistic family. If Hindi and Urdū are considered to be same language (Hindustani (or Hindi-Urdū)), then Urdū can be considered to be a part of a dialect continuum which extends across eastern Iran, Afghanistan and modern Pakistan [citation needed]—right into north India. These idioms all have similar grammatical structures and share a large portion of their vocabulary. Punjabi, for instance, is very similar to Urdū: Punjabi written in the Shahmukhi script can be understood by speakers of Urdū with little difficulty, but spoken Punjabi has a very different phonology (pronunciation system) and can be harder to understand for Urdū speakers